Stoic Week in Review

Stoic Week was a weeklong exercise in practicing Stoicism with structure provided by the Stoic Week Handbook. There were questionaires before and after; with the goal of quantitatively measuring the effectiveness of Stoicism. I’m not privy to exactly how that works , but I recorded my own results and am going to interpret them here.

The Scales

The scales measure one’s psychological resources, balance of positive and negative feelings, satisfaction with life and Stoic attitudes and behaviours.

My major criticism of the system and the questionaires is; my awareness and familiarity of the questions may reduce their accuracy—it is difficult to answer objectively when I know the desired outcome is to score better.

Results

Comparing my results on the pre and post questionaires I was able to calculate the percent change in each of the four scales:

20% increase on the Flourishing Scale

16% increase on the Satisfaction with Life Scale

30% increase of Affect Balance on the SPANE Scale

16% increase on the Stoic Attitudes and Behaviour Scales

Observations

Before Stoic Week I had been practicing Stocism at my own pace and in my own way—mostly some reading reflection and writing. I would have said A week ago that I am quite Stoic, though still struggling to control my emotions and actions. After Stoic Week I can confidently say that by following the daily meditations, readings an exercises of Stoic Week I feel more Stoic. I more clearly see where my shortcomings are and have more resources and ability to stay mindful and control my actions.

What I’d like to do nest is get copies of The Meditations and The Handbook and become a bit more regimented in my practice of Stoicsm.

The Stoic Week founders say they will check in on us to see how we’re doing. If I’ve learned anything this past week it’s that I don’t have control over their behaviour of following up; so, I’m going to continue to track my own progress to make sure this is, in fact, the right philosophy for me.

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1 Comment

Shaun M

One would imagine that your specific knowledge of the desired change is also what will allow you to produce that change–at least with a sufficient level of commitment–so it presumably not a detriment. Assuming some integrity, the intention to score higher on the ratings will also focus the intention to work on the self (and perfect the soul).